


Babysitting Blues

by ambiguously



Category: Star Wars Sequel Trilogy, The Mandalorian (TV)
Genre: Babysitting, F/M, Treat, don't ask me about timelines
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-14
Updated: 2020-02-14
Packaged: 2021-02-28 03:55:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,502
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22617496
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ambiguously/pseuds/ambiguously
Summary: It's Kylo's turn to watch him.
Relationships: Kylo Ren & Baby Yoda (The Mandalorian), Rey/Ben Solo | Kylo Ren
Comments: 28
Kudos: 95
Collections: Chocolate Box - Round 5





	Babysitting Blues

**Author's Note:**

  * For [lucymonster](https://archiveofourown.org/users/lucymonster/gifts).



As soon as he opened the door to his quarters, he sensed it. Kylo narrowed his eyes, sweeping the room for intruders. It wasn't Rey. He could sense her unique presence from a thousand star systems away, and at the moment, she was back to ignoring him.

He stepped into the room, his hand on the hilt of his lightsaber. Perhaps this was one of Hux's simpering plots against him. Kylo tolerated them only because they served as diverting exercise while giving Hux a personal stake in stopping all other plots against the Supreme Leader lest someone else have the honor of killing him. Better the betrayal from where he expected to find one than an unexpected stab in the night.

A shiver passed through him, and he pushed away the memory, shoving it deep into a locked place inside himself. Kylo heard a strange cooing sound which went straight to his hindbrain, shuttering away the dangerous, sad memories with more pertinent worries. Even before he located the sound, he knew.

The child sat among cushions on his floor, pulled to the ground from Kylo's bed and sitting area by a determined small green claw of a hand. He looked up at Kylo with a knowing grin.

Kylo let out a groan, and pulled out his lightsaber anyway. He lit it, pointing the red tip at the little creature. "I should end you."

The child cooed again. Against his own volition, Kylo doused his erratic blade and clipped it to his belt. Mind control via the Force was not one of his better skills. Among others, he'd noted verbal commands were typically required to exert their will upon another. This particular child remained non-verbal but unlike most other Force users, he didn't need to speak his desires. He wielded his powers, and sentients fell into his thrall. His worst enemies turned from from belligerence to an unfamiliar desire to protect and nurture.

Kylo found his steps moving towards the boy. He lifted him into his arms and stared into the dark eyes. "I hate you."

The child made another squeaking coo.

"How did you get aboard?" He knew who'd last taken custody of this child, although he hadn't seen the man in years. Had he somehow crept aboard the First Order command ship, left the boy, and departed again? With the child's mental abilities, this was not as far-fetched a theory as it might be.

Kylo ought to toss him out the nearest airlock. Ordering one of his underlings to assassinate the child would only lead to his men fawning over him instead. He'd seen this before. Even now, he was unconsciously jiggling the child in his arms to soothe him and idly considering what he could feed him. Ordering mush for his own dinner would only invite questions and encourage Hux to sprinkle poison into his food again.

Kylo was no one's babysitter. He'd been forced to take a turn watching over this creature when he'd been younger, like every other Force-sensitive in his family's sphere of acquaintances. "There are so few of us, we must take care of each other," he heard in his head, the words of someone long dead. The bad memories threatened again.

The child tilted his head up at Kylo, his deep gaze offering a strange lightening of Kylo's weariness. The repetitious noise inside his mind, cursing himself for all his failures, subsided into quiet.

"That's you, isn't it?"

This might be interesting.

He touched the comlink. "Send two dishes of mush to my quarters and tell General Hux I wish to see him." He bounced the boy again. "We'll make him eat from both bowls first while we watch. Would you like to Force choke him? I could help you. We could make it a game."

The child grinned again.

* * *

At first, he left the child in his quarters. Kylo was not especially surprised to discover he suddenly had a small green shadow following him as he stalked through the corridors of his ship.

"Fine," he said. "Go where you want. I am not carrying you."

* * *

The device was designed as a portable supply carrier, strapped to the chest of a stormtrooper or aide in the thick of a fight. It could hold medical supplies, rations, extra ammunition, or a three kilogram green non-human.

He reasoned that the child was a liability. One with such gifts with mind control should not be let out of Kylo's sight, and his own legs were far longer than the boy's. He could growl orders to his underlings, and he could bark commands at his Generals, and he could spar with his Knights, and the boy would be secure and close by.

Kylo threw the first person to laugh at him into the nearest wall.

* * *

"What are you doing?"

He turned. Rey watched him from whatever base the Resistance was hiding out at this time. Her hair was mussed and a light perspiration covered her face, as though she'd been exerting herself. Strands of dark curls captured his attention for a long moment.

"I am engaging in relaxation," he said, hoping to sound calm and important. He rested on the cushions on his floor, having chosen not to return them to their proper location. The child nestled in the crook of his arm as they watched a holofilm Kylo liked. The child made amusing noises mimicking the blaster fire during the battle scenes. A number of Kylo's favorite collection pieces were strewn across the floor, several of them covered in spit. He found he didn't mind.

"What are you doing to that poor creature?"

The boy turned to face her, his happy smile wide on his face and one claw raised in greeting. Kylo's uncle had been able to see the strange visual projection Rey and Kylo shared with each other. Apparently Luke hadn't been alone in that ability.

"He's fine."

Rey came closer, her usual wariness overcome by curiosity, and also, Kylo suspected, by the child's abilities. "I've never seen anyone like him before."

"His species is rare. We suspected he's the last."

"We?" Rey considered this. "You mean Luke."

He didn't like the prickle in his mind when Rey mentioned Uncle Luke. "Among others, yes. He's very young for his species. We've all taken turns for his caretaking over the years."

"You're babysitting."

"I am not."

"You are." She settled closer, sitting wherever she was but seeming to rest beside them on another cushion. "What's his name?"

"That depends on who you ask." Kylo began bouncing him again. He was under the child's thrall. This should be intolerable but was instead pleasing. He extended one gloved finger to play with a strand of the boy's hair. "Isn't that right, Kriffhead?"

Rey made a face. "Who did you kill to get him?"

"I didn't. He came aboard."

"Your security forces are terrible. This is why we're going to win."

He didn't feel like arguing with her, which he thought was another sign this creature had infected his brain. He tried a different tactic. "Join me and you can cuddle him."

Rey sighed. Then she said, "Where is your ship?"

"Hydian Way heading away from the Core." A spark of amused delight shot through him as he understood why she was asking. "I could meet you on Terminus in three cycles."

She paused. "I could meet you there in four." That gave him a rough distance to their base, which he could relay to his intelligence forces if he wanted to make their jobs easier. He knew he wouldn't, nor would be bring his troops with him to the rendezvous.

Someone out of the holofilms would say something like, "It's a date." If this were a holofilm, Rey would smile, maybe even blush, and agree, or pretend not to agree. "Four days," he said instead. "Come alone." She vanished.

Rey would come, and she could meet the child in person, and she would fall under his spell as everyone else who met the boy seemed to do. She may agree to take him off Kylo's hands, thus ridding him of a potential weakness. Another possibility loomed large in his imagination: perhaps she would be so enthralled by the child's aura, she would accept Kylo's offer this time and join him.

"What do you think?" he asked the child. "Will she join us?"

In response, a small pebble he'd collected from Crait floated into the air, hovering over Kylo's hand but not falling into his palm. He reached for the pebble, but it darted away until he made a quick, sharp grab. He looked back at the child.

"You think I'm going to join her instead." The boy said nothing, instead returning his attention to the holofilm. "I won't." Still no response. The child cuddled into his arms, getting comfortable as he watched the bright lights of the latest space battle. "She must join us, or else." The child made the blaster noises, ignoring him.

Kylo sighed.

"Fine. We'll see."


End file.
